The Darkness Between the Stars
by optimustaud
Summary: Hei searches for his sister and grows up in the process. Language. Spoilers for most of the anime.


A quick character study. I hope you enjoy.

I own nothing.

* * *

Hei didn't like to think about Brazil. It was a chaotic jumble of sweat and stink and terror in his memories. Pai stood out in his mind, like a lilly floating in a pool of blood. He remembered a night illuminated only by the glow of those horrible false stars. He had knelt in a lake surrounded by the bobbing corpses of the dead his hand wrapped around his sisters vulnerable neck. He had been so desperate, so close then to simply snapping the bone and ending her life (his life).

He had not hated his sister. Quite the contrary, he had built his entire life around her. Pai could not be anything other than what she was and he had followed her into this shadowy half-life. It was his privilege as her elder brother.

His one desperate wish was for her to understand that he loved her. But she had been contractor since she was a child. Any memory of human emotions had faded, replaced by the cool logic of her kind. Her inability to understand him was not her fault, but there were times Hei hated her for it.

In the end she left him. His idol, his anchor, the star that he had orbited his entire life was gone and he had no idea if she was even still alive. It was some kind of cosmic joke that he lost his sister on nearly the same day he gained her power and her star. It was even worse when he realized gaining this power had not purged him of the human emotions that had cut him off from his contractor comrades.

It would have been better if Pai had killed him.

* * *

Hei drifted accepting jobs from the Syndicate because it was the only thing he knew how to do. He learned all of those mundane lessons that a scarred child-soldier would have had no use for. He learned to wrap himself in congeniality and to disguise his skill behind a mask of banality and awkwardness. Eventually people stopped noticing the hollow eyed man child hunting in their midst. There came a time when he could no longer tell who was real; Hei or Li Shengshun.

* * *

Mai Kashiwagi was the first person to infiltrate that tiny shriveled area of his heart that had once belonged to Pai. She was a tiny thing, her face still soft and rounded with the last vestiges of her childhood. She had looked up to him half afraid the first time they met. That look had slowly turned to trust and then outright admiration. He hadn't done anything that spectacular, just spent some time listening to her.

He felt a sick hollow of despair form in his stomach when she showed him the diamond bright mark on her wrist. He knew that despite her Father's best efforts it would only be a matter of time before she became a contractor like Pai. And it hurt. Mai was so much like the little sister he remembered before Pai had turned.

In the end he was worse than useless, unable to protect that girl or her Father. That night Mai's sing-song voice echoed through his dreams.

* * *

He had been shocked when he pulled Carmine from the back of November 11's car. He had heard the rumor that she had lost her contractor abilities after the war in Brazil.

Her green eyes glowed faintly beneath the street lamps; her face was as calm and unaffected as it had always been. There were smudged grey circles under her eyes. Getting the assignment to rescue her from PANDORA was a blessing. She had been one of the last people to see Pai before she disappeared.

Hei took her back to a defunct bar and tied her to a chair. He was certain she would not tell him what he wanted to know, nor would she fall prey to the congenial charm of Li Shengshun. It had been five years since he had needed to torture someone.

She told him she didn't know what had happened to Pai. He didn't believe her. He broke her fingers, watched her body arch and writhe in the chair. He tried to fall into that hazy twilight mind that had protected him from the horrors of Brazil. Some distant part of him noted how thin she was and that the flimsy negligee she wore stank of sex.

Carmine kept talking and Hei was filled with a new fear. She had no idea what had happened to Pai and Amber. She started to speculate on Hei's strangely emotional responses. Hei hit her hard enough to knock her to the floor.

_Are you really a contractor?_

If he wasn't a contractor then what the hell else could he possibly be? He straightened the bird boned woman and laid her in the booth. Shame flooded through him, she was right. He wasn't acting like a contractor. He set his energy to the much simpler task of cooking.

It was strange to sit with her eating. It was strange to hear the gravelly sound of her laughter. In the end, she agreed to help him find out what happened to Pai.

They set out into the night moving towards Hell's Gate. Carmine reached for him, her lean fingers grasping at his hands. He turned and saw her eyes wide with fear. Her powers were starting to come back and in exchange she was losing her human emotions.

Then they were running back through the empty alleyways of the abandoned section of Tokyo. It started to rain. November 11 and his operatives had caught up to them.

Carmine was hit by November 11's ice shards. Hei dragged her to safety, knowing it was already too late. It was the look in her eyes as she passed away; a mix of sadness and affection, and forgiveness that had unsettled Hei the most. He was still no closer to finding his sister.

In the aftermath Yin reached out and grabbed his gloved hand, squeezing his fingers gently.

* * *

Misaki Kirihara earned his respect the night they hid from Alice Wang. She was brave and no stranger to dangerous situations. He counted bullets right along with her as they hid in the underbrush of the Wang's indoor garden. Her grasp of logistics and her cool headed analysis of the situation impressed him in spite of himself.

Together they sheltered in a cramped bathroom stall and he listened as she planned. She was funny and genuine. Her honest care for his well being surprised him. It had been a long time since anyone had wanted to protect him.

* * *

The PANDORA mission made him nervous. He would be observed nearly every minute he was in the facility. If something went wrong there would be no place he could run.

As he approached the Gate he felt a slight tug at his senses, like a persistent itch at the base of his nose. It was easy enough to ignore. He wondered why the Syndicate would send a contractor on a mission like this. He was half convinced he would be caught in the initial examination.

Inside the facility he joined with the cleaning staff and met with his contact. He kept his eyes opened and his mouth shut listening as he mopped and swept and vacuumed. It really was the perfect cover, no one paid attention to the guy cleaning the floors. One day he stumbled across the room full of Satake telescopes.

Desire overrode common sense and he entered the treasure room. His fingers hovered achingly over the graceful white curves of the barrell. He remembered entire nights spent under the open sky watching planets and constellations with his sister. He remembered childish wishes made on shooting stars and dreaming of the universe that existed beyond the curve of the planet. It filled him with longing. His chest hurt.

A voice, half angry, interrupted his thoughts. That was how he met Nick Hillman, formerly of NASA. He was Hei's white reflection. He was the man Hei might have been had he never gotten involved with the Syndicate. They sat on the rooftop with an old Satake and talked about the old sky and old dreams of traveling the void between the stars.

_Look to the sky and believe that you can see the moon and the Milky Way. Believe that the rockets we sent into the stratosphere haven't gone missing and that all the old constellations are still there._

There must have been just enough faith left in his heart because he could see that glorious sky when he looked through Nick's Satake.

Hei dragged himself through his mission haunted by the ghost of his sister and heartened by Nick's brotherly affection. Still, he was only half surprised when Nick tried to kill him.

_Every word you ever said to me was a lie. You're a contactor, and contractors can't dream._

During the fight the Meteor Shard started to glow and the two of them were bathed in a warm golden light. Hei looked up and saw the old stars, his stars. The pain in his chest grew and hollowed out his insides. He was tired of chasing impossible dreams. Then, Nick changed. He shrank to his wide eyed child self. In the distance was a rocket that looked like it had been drawn into that golden landscape with a set of blunt crayons. Laughing and joyful the child Nick ran and boarded the one dimensional rocket. The impossible spacecraft lit its engines and climbed towards that beautiful sky.

When the gold cleared all that remained of Nick was his lab coat. In the end, he got his wish. Nick made it to the stars. It was Hei who remained behind like a worm in the earth.

He would have cried if he thought it was possible and then he turned saw Yin's specter watching him from a puddle.

* * *

Yin had been acting strange for days before she disappeared. When it started Hei's stomach twisted in something that might have been concern. When she left that concern blossomed into a worry he could not ignore. The Syndicate had only one way to deal with desertion.

He was startled to find how much her disappearance affected him. She had always been there, like a child's security blanket. He had taken her silent presence and her little gestures of kindness for granted.

He found her with a tall blonde man who had been as important to her as her own Father. "It's your choice," he told her, entranced by the fresh tear tracks tracing down her cheeks.

She chose to stay. "Are you sure?" he had asked. She pulled her cheek into some semblance of a half smile

There was a part of him who thought she was a fool for not accepting Kastinen's offer. Maybe some part of her understood what would happen if the Syndicate found them and acted preemptively to protect Kastinen. The fleeting thought that she had staid because of him was too terrifying to embrace.

* * *

_Amber_

She was an old wound that never quite healed, although he had become very good at forcing himself not to remember her. She was also the last living lead he had on his sister. As soon as he heard she was in Tokyo every other thought in his head was banished and replaced by the all consuming obsession of tracking her down.

He had forgotten what she was, allowed himself to fall in love with her, and she had manipulated his emotions and betrayed him. Even worse, her scheming had lead directly to Pai's disappearance. He didn't know exactly what had happened that night and now he had no desire to know. He wanted his revenge. He wanted his sister.

He hadn't needed to waste his time looking for Amber, she left him an invitation. He met her in the courtyard of an old shrine. Yin was with her. Amber had grown impossibly young in the years since he had last seen her. He wondered how many times she had paid her contract.

She had run towards him seemingly concerned over his injury. That cold hollow in his chest filled with rage and he struck her. Then she laid down her offer:

_Come with me, Hei. If you do I'll take you to her. But if this city has to disappear into darkness as a result what would you do?_

In the aftermath it was Yin, quiet and steadfast, who remained by his side.

* * *

Kenji Sakurai was not that much younger than Hei, but standing next to the boy he felt decades older. It was the same when he met his neighbors for the first time. All of them were so happy and open. He couldn't help but think of them as kids. He buried himself in food and listened to them banter back and forth absorbing every detail about their lives. It reminded him of just how alone he was. Still, for this moment it was nice to pretend.

_Li-san you sure are a strange one._

He hoped Kenji never found out just how strange he was.

* * *

Tokyo descended into chaos. Huang was dead; the depth of Hei's grief surprised him. Mao was as good as dead, trapped by the limitations of a cat's mind. The contractors were behaving strangely, almost as if they were human. And all around them the stars were falling.

He stood inside Hell's gate with Yin and Amber. Amber was even younger this time. Finally, after years of grief he heard the truth about what happened to his sister and what happened in Brazil all those years ago.

_Pai was one of the first to discover the Syndicate's plan. It's only natural you didn't find out about all this. You were the last person in the world she wanted to get dragged in to all this. All she's done, she did to protect you. After all, you weren't the same as us, you were still human. And you still are._

He had been a fool. He had been so angry, so lost in his grief that he had never thought to question the motives of the Syndicate. He was still angry. He was the older brother. Pai should have told him, should have trusted him with a secret that big whether or not he was still human.

_You started working for the Syndicate to stay near her and to show her you were on her side after she became a contractor. But she knew how hard the work was on you and that made her sad. Little by little it changed her._

Pai had loved him, had understood the sacrifices he had made to support her. He had simply been too blind to see it. Pai had loved him and she had expressed it in the only way a contractor could; she had chosen to protect him. He survived Heaven's Gate because Pai had fused with him.

Then Amber told him the stakes; human or contractor and only one of them could survive. He had to decide whether to use Pai's power to seal the gate and doom the nation of Japan, or to allow Hell's Gate to be destroyed and doom every contractor and doll on the planet.

He couldn't do it. He thought of Nick and Mai. He thought of Kenji and Misaki. He remembered that glorious afternoon he had spent doing nothing more spectacular than eating a meal with his neighbors. He remembered Yin's cool hands and unswerving loyalty. How in the world could he willingly choose to murder any of them? Then Amber pressed the Meteor Shard to his chest and just like before the world exploded into a gold haze.

He was a child again, running through the haze desperately trying to escape the weight of that decision. It was too sad, too painful. _I don't want to kill anyone, ever again, _the thought ran through him bringing him to his knees. When he looked up he saw the great expanse of that lost sky; the constellations were winking calmly in the dark, the Milky Way was a splash of silver against the night. It always came down to this choice, the old stars or the stars of the contractors. Inside he was begging for guidance.

Help came in the form of his old ghosts. They were all there; Carmine, November 11, Mao, Hwan, Pai, and of course Amber. It was only because of them that he was able to see the truth of himself, to understand who he was and who he wanted to be. In the end, he understood he didn't have to choose one or the other; humans and contractors, he could choose both.

When the decision was made that gold world disappeared in a whirlwind of darkness. The winds tumbled him, battering his body with their icy force. It would have been so easy to go limp, to let the winds rip him apart.

Then he heard a voice.

_Hei come back._

_Please, don't leave me here alone._

It was simply not him to abandon someone who needed him. Hei raised his hand and reached for the stars.

* * *

The scene with Nick Hillman and Hei inside Heaven's Gate is one of the most beautiful, poignant scenes I have ever watched in an anime. It says so much about Hei's character and does it in such a subtle manner. I don't feel like I really did it justice here, but I gave it my best shot.

Thanks everyone for taking the time to read this far :)


End file.
